Lukashenko brandishes prospect of death sentence for blogger Roman Protasevich

Roman Protasevich may not escape the death penalty, Alexander Lukashenko has said — with the unpredictable dictator hinting that his number one prisoner may even be transferred to insurgent fighters in the non-recognised, Russian backed Donbass to get his way.

In largely overlooked comments made on Monday, Belarus’s leader said Mr Protasevich had been responsible for “grave crimes” in eastern Ukraine that could correspond to the highest sentence.

“[Protasevich] killed people there, in Donbass, and he shouted [on the plane] that he was worried about the death penalty,” Mr Lukashenko said. “He knew what he was talking about. He knew there could be questions from southeastern Ukraine. How it changes everything.”

As Ryanair flight 4978 swerved and changed its course for Minsk, a panicked Mr Protasevich, who was arrested alongside his Russian girlfriend Sofia Sapega, told fellow passengers that execution awaited him on landing. In the event, he was charged under crimes understood to carry a maximum 15 years in jail. But Mr Lukashenko’s latest comments appear to be making room for a more shocking turn.

Speaking with The Independent, Mr Protasevich’s parents said they were convinced the de facto president meant what he said about taking their son’s life.

“We are very worried and don’t know what, if anything, will stop him,” Dmitry Protasevich said. Their 26-year-old son had become a “personal enemy” of an erratic leader, which was the “most frightening scenario” they could imagine.

“Any sane person would have stopped by now, but Lukashenko is carrying on, destroying the Belarusian nation and taking more innocent lives.”

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State television has been increasingly forthright in promoting unproven claims about Roman Protasevich fighting for controversial unofficial military formations in eastern Ukraine. On 26 May Ivan Tertel, head of the Belarusian intelligence agency KGB, announced there was “evidence” Mr Protasevich had fought as a mercenary and could be “connected to terrorism” and the “deaths of innocent people” in Ukraine.

The elder Protasevich described these accusations as “a black PR campaign” designed to cast doubt on the motivations of his son.

In terms of the facts, Roman Protasevich was indeed embedded for a long time with Azov, a controversial Ukrainian division which has a strong ultra-nationalistic element. Photos show the blogger, then aged 19 and 20, in camouflage and sporting Azov badges. But in interviews, he has always claimed he was embedded only as a journalist.

Certainly, he would not have been the first young hack to have made questionable decisions on embed policies and wearing military fatigues on the frontline.

The former commander of Azov, Andriy Biletsky, provided some detail on Mr Protasevich’s role during fighting near the port town of Mariupol in 2015.

“Roman fought with Azov and other military formations against [Russian] occupiers,” Mr Biletsky said. “His weapon was not an automatic rifle, but the written word.”

Another former Azov fighter told The Independent that they did not remember Mr Protasevich ever taking part in fighting – suggesting that he was too “wimpy” to have done so.

In the televised remarks, Alexander Lukashenko did not clarify the exact threat he was making to his young opponent. He did not, for example, say if he intended to hand him over to officials representing Russian-backed military formations, or whether he was intending to try him in Minsk according to the separatists’ rules. Either way, Mr Protasevich is not assured of a fair trial.

Nasta Loika, a human rights activist at Human Constanta, a Belarusian NGO, said there was no obvious legal way Mr Lukashenko could follow through on his threat.

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There are two possible grounds for Belarus to transfer one of its citizens, she said. The first was in the case of a bilateral legal agreement, which a priori is impossible in the case of an unrecognised separatist state. The second is a formal application and decision process, via the state prosecutor. But there are several exceptions – including supposed military crimes – which make that an impossible route too.

“Of course, that’s the legal moment, but Belarus isn’t really a legal state so we are talking about a personal, political decision,” Ms Loika said.

“And that’s what makes it frightening.”